


Genealogy

by pyrrhical (anoyo)



Series: Really Old Fic [16]
Category: 1984 - George Orwell
Genre: Contemplate Outside Perspective, Dystopian, Gen, somewhat meta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-10-24
Updated: 2005-10-24
Packaged: 2018-10-10 03:49:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10428474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anoyo/pseuds/pyrrhical
Summary: "All right, now, while mommy's away at her big meeting, you two are going to be staying with grandma."





	

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written 10/24/05. This was written with two classmates for my AP English 2 class, my senior year of high school.

"All right, now, while mommy's away at her big meeting, you two are going to be staying with grandma," Loretta Silks, business woman and mom extraordinaire, said quickly, pulling her two sons, Emmett and Jacob, out of the expensive 2019 Ford Suburban she'd bought with last year's Christmas bonus. "Be good," she advised, grabbing their matching duffel bags off the rear leather bench seat, brushing away a piece of invisible dust as she did so, "and don't cause grandma any problems, you hear me?" She handed the boys their duffels, standing back to look at them. Straightening Emmett's forever disheveled jacket, she continued, "I'll be back Sunday night for dinner, and then we'll go home. All right?"

The boys nodded in unison and she smiled, satisfied, before leading them up the walk to her mother's house. Her mother, aging in a pleasantly widowed fashion, had lived alone for several years. From what Loretta remembered, Ruth had always been a quiet, introspective woman, prone to bouts of random illness. However, she hadn't been hospitalized in a few years, so she figured her children would be fine in the elderly woman's care for a weekend. If not, well, kids were resilient.

She quickly knocked twice on the door before pushing it open, calling, "Mom? We're here!" and ushering her sons into the old, rustic house. She took a quick moment to place her sons' duffels on an overstuffed sofa before winding her way into the sitting room, where her mother hadn't even made the effort to put down her knitting. 

Ruth looked up expectantly at her daughter, as though waiting for her to make the first move.

"Boys, this is your grandmother," Loretta said, ignoring her mother instead of playing her game. "I'm sure you remember her from Christmas two years ago." When the boys nodded, she continued, "I'm also sure that you'll have a lovely weekend with her. If you need anything, don't be afraid to ask." She gave them a last once-over before kissing them both on the forehead and taking her leave.

The boys, left to fend for themselves, stood in the doorway, watching as their grandmother went back to knitting. After about ten minutes of watching the old, gray woman knit, the boys found themselves becoming rather fidgety. As intriguing as the bright yellow, red, and green afghan was turning out to be, it wasn't enough to keep their pre-intellectual minds entertained.

After shifting from one leg to the other, back again, and then onto the balls of their feet, Emmett and Jacob managed to finally catch their grandmother's attention. She sighed in an almost resigned way before placing her knitting carefully on her lap and turning her eyes upon the boys. "Would either of you boys like a snack?" she asked kindly, though the emotion failed to register on her face.

Emmett, being the elder brother by a whole year and ten months, fielded that question, "Could you tell us a story, maybe?" he asked, almost too quietly to be heard.

Startled at the seeming non sequitir, Ruth couldn't do much but agree. "What would you like to hear a story of?" she asked, putting her knitting into a magazine-rack-gone-cloth-pouch next to her easy chair.

The boys looked at one another for a second, as though surprised she'd actually agreed. "The war," Jacob said in his almost a big boy voice. "Miss Havisham told us there was a war once." He grinned. "And I knew that word and Taylor Currick didn't, and she's really smart!"

Ruth nodded slowly, crossing her arms in her lap. "Sit down, then," she said, "and I'll tell you what I remember from the war."

The boys hurried to sit down on the sofa across from Ruth, and squished themselves together so they were comfortable. They were both tremendously curious; Emmett had overheard Jacob asking their mother that very same question, but she had been decidedly evasive, and they had both been dying to know ever since. Now, apparently, they'd get their answers.

"To start with," Ruth said, "the war began a long time ago. Around the time I was born, actually." The boys were enthralled: as far as they knew, she'd been around forever. "We never thought it would come to us, as locked in the middle of the city as we were." Here her eyes gained a wispy look, as though she was, perhaps, half in the present and half in the past. "I remember every detail of when they first came to our home. There were five of them," she said, shifting slightly in the seat for comfort. "They were all dressed in these black uniforms, and they introduced themselves as the Thought Police." She finished rearranging herself. "Mother and I were so confused by the name. It wasn't particularly sensible to call oneself the 'thought police,' we thought. Since, how can one person police another person's thoughts? But that's who they were, and that's what they did. They asked us if it was just the two of us, and my mother answered, no, because I had another brother." She pursed her lips. "Elder, I think he was. Winston. He was out doing something-or-other. The details blur." She refocused on the boys. "I was very sick at the time, you see, with something no one knew the name for then, and no one remembers now.

"But, nonetheless, Winston wasn't present. To this day, I don't know what happened to him, but I can assume it was similar to what happened to my mother and I. We were taken to a large building, portions of which must have been underground, as it was murky and cold, and the air was dense. While we were down there, a group of strange men came to visit us every day, bringing with them a bag of little things." Ruth pursed her lips in remembrance. "A few little gadgets, some pictures, and a piece of paper with numbers scrawled on it. I'm not sure what the things were for, and I'll probably never know, but they're inconsequential in the long run. Eventually, they dumped mother and I in a small town somewhere to the north of Kent. 

"To our surprise, we were taken in almost immediately. Our benefactors were a lady and her husband, both about my age then as I am now, with two grown children and three spotted cats. They were willing to let us stay as long as we liked, but mother declined that offer. As soon as we were financially fit, she said, we'd go find a place of our own. Unfortunately, myself being a sickly child, we never reached the monetary point at which we could live on our own, and mother fell irrevocably ill in that house." She paused, and the boys expected the sort of sniffling almost-cry that their mother gave when speaking about someone past -- their grandfather, perhaps -- but were disappointed. She only seemed to gather her thoughts.

"I believe she had the wasting sickness. She got more and more tired, and then her thoughts stopped coming fluidly. After a time, the men that'd dropped us off in the village came back and told us that she'd need to go with them for some testing. They took her away, in some sort of suspended vehicle, and we never saw her again. Shortly after that I met Karl, your grandfather." She stopped and then nodded, once, as though confirming a thought she'd had. "We met at a small neighborhood gathering, when my friend Kathy told me I absolutely must try her jambalaya. Karl, your grandfather, was Kathy's cousin's boyfriend's brother, and he'd tagged along for the food, or the women, or the scenery change. To this day, I'm not sure on why, but I am sure that we hit it off quite quickly. Two days later, he came calling at the house, and, after a sixth month period of dating, we were betrothed. We went to the South of Wales for our Honeymoon. Expensive, yes, but Karl had recently inherited his father's grocery. 

"That was in 1984, I believe. Three years later, your mother was born, then Charlie and Michael in 1989." Ruth checked her mental math. "Right before Loretta was born, we started hearing the name 'Guy Ogilvy' repeated in certain circles. Before long it was everywhere, whispered throughout parties and in sitting rooms across the nation. As far as we knew, he was just some upstart from Eastasia, but he quickly proved himself to be more than that." She stopped her speech to stare at the boys. "I'm sure you know at least a little about him," she said before checking herself. "Perhaps not by that name, but you do know about him."

Emmett was confused, and he was curious past the point of caring how ignorant he looked. "Why wouldn't we know that name, grandma?" he asked, voice full of youthful sincerity, as though the answer to this question was the answer to all of life's riddles. 

"Because he changed it," Ruth said succinctly. "He changed it sometime around when he conquered all of Eastasia and Eurasia." She ignored the fact that the boys couldn't possibly know those names. "To you he would be known as Creighton Oleander." The boys' eyes grew large; of course they knew the name of the World's High Sovereign. "By then, everyone knew of His Grace, but we didn't know he'd already infiltrated the Oceanian Inner Party."

The boys were looking at her in awe, as though they'd seen the face of Their Great Leader transfixed upon her fixtures, and were channeling his glory through her. "How'd he do that, grandma?" Jacob asked, sitting near the edge of his seat.

Ruth nodded in silent praise. "Good question. That's something we all wanted the answer to after he took over the nation. But he didn't wait long to give us the answer. Through many different connections, he waded his way into the Inner Party, playing it stupid but staying smart underneath -- always an intricate task -- until he'd wormed his way into their graces. Member by member, he killed off existing officers of the Inner Party, putting his own men and women into their places until the Party itself was under his direct control.

"Then he killed off Big Brother."

Emmett and Jacob sat waiting, confused at that seemingly final statement. Finally, Jacob asked, in a quiet voice, "Who's Big Brother?" as though he was ashamed he didn't already know.

"Big Brother was the leader of the Party itself. He was more of a figurehead than anything else, but the Party members thought he was indestructible. By killing him, he pulled the rug out from under them, so to speak. They didn't know which was right or left without looming posters of Big Brother everywhere, watching and correcting their every move. His Grace took advantage of that, as any man would have, and reset the government to his own standards. Then, all he had to do was mesh the three countries he ruled over -- effectively all the world -- and created a unified world nation; namely, the World Sphere. 

"To this day he runs an efficient government, which we all live peacefully in." She sat back in her seat, eyes losing some of their sheen.

The boys sat and stared at their grandmother for a few moments, an awkward silence filling the air. Emmett opened his mouth to speak, but was saved the effort when the sound of a bell ringing throughout the countryside split the air.

To Emmett and Jacob's great shock, their grandmother, as she picked up the remote to her television, broke into a large grin, teeth poking out the edges. All through her story, they'd been awed by her ability to remain completely apathetic. Now, as she clicked the "Power" button, she looked almost ravenous.

"Those are the four o'clock bells," she said, voice dripping with enthusiasm. "It's time for the midday executions. I wonder who it'll be this time! They always save the gruesome ones for the evening bell, but midday isn't anything to scoff at either." 

With the click-on of the television, Ruth, Emmett, and Jacob turned to transfix themselves with an apparent delight to watch the men marching, arms bound before them, across the Technicolor screen across the room.


End file.
